The Lone Wolf's Home
by Undomiel5
Summary: Even a lone wolf has to have a place to come back to.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I do not own Numb3rs, its particular characters, or the plots of its episodes. All I own are the plots of my specific stories and a few original characters.

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It was near midnight when Ian unlocked the apartment door and slipped inside. Out of long-ingrained habits he scanned the visible parts of the apartment for dangers or signs of life.

He had been away for 4 long weeks tracking a dangerous fugitive in North Dakota who was wanted by the FBI for shooting and killing two of their own. For most of that time he had been out of touch far from civilization and, thus, the reach of cell phone towers. At the beginning of the 4th week he had ended up close enough to a town to receive a text from his wife saying that she was heading out with her team on a hostage-rescue mission to South Carolina. During the next days he had been caught up with the chase as he drew ever closer to his target. Finally he had captured the fugitive and only four hours earlier had managed to return to Quantico. Once he had finished completed the bureaucratic nonsense necessary for wrapping up his case, it was past 11:30. In those ensuing hours he had repeatedly checked his phone but had found no new message from his wife. So stepping into his apartment, he did not know if she was home or not.

After closing the door quietly and double-checking the lock, Ian set down his backpack and rifle case temporarily in front of the fridge right next to the door. He stood quietly for a minute letting his eyes adjust to the extreme darkness of the apartment. Straight in front of him down the wide hall were rows of floor to ceiling windows looking over the main living space of the apartment. As snipers neither Ian nor his wife was comfortable with being that exposed. Thus, most of each window was blocked by three large bookcases. While this made the rooms less exposed, it also drastically cut down the amount of light in the apartment at night.

Once his eyes had adjusted to the darkness, it took only a few moments for Ian to pick up signs of his wife's presence. Her favorite fleece-lined vest was draped one of the chairs at the dining room table, its white fleece clearly visible even in the darkness. Considering the current low temperatures, she would unlikely have left it behind. As he prowled further into the apartment, he saw the dark blobs that were her own backpack and rifle case lying parallel to the small couch, their dark color standing out against the lighter colored couch. Two more strides brought him to the end of the hallway. Rounding the corner he caught sight of the person whom he had been looking for and hoping to find. His wife was curled up on her side on the left side of the bed where she always slept.

He moved closer slowly, quietly, not wanting to disturb her, but yet wanting to make sure she was okay. He moved up the narrow space between her side of the bed and the closet close enough to see her face. The clock on her bedside tablet was lit in large, glowing green letters that cast an eerie light over her sleeping form. As he knelt beside her, he was concerned to see that were two small rows on butterfly bandages on her face, one high up on her forehead and the other on the left cheek. He scanned her body, searching the darkness with his eyes for any clues pointing to other injuries. With a repressed sigh of relief he found none. Seeing that the covers had slipped half-way down her torso as she slept and knowing her propensity for getting cold, Ian carefully pulled them back up around her shoulders and then smoothed a hand lightly over her dark hair.

Moving back to the hall he grabbed his bag and rifle case and moved them out of the walking path, setting them down by his wife's things behind the couch. As he moved around the room with noiseless steps putting essential things away and getting out of his dusty work clothes, his gaze was periodically drawn back to the bed where his wife slept on. Considering the fact that she still not stirred, he knew that she had only returned that same night and was absolutely exhausted. His wife was usually a light sleeper and would often awake when he came in the door. But exhaustion made her much harder to wake, which could be good or bad depending on circumstances.

Ian had had someone to come home to for just over a year now, but he still found it strange. For so long he had lived the life of a lone wolf hunting down fugitives for the FBI; his apartment had been the very epitome of barren and Spartan; he had frequently lived out of a duffle bag for weeks on end. He had had relationships before, but they had never lasted more than couple weeks. Few could put up with the job he did: the long absences without news, his dedication to his job. But then three years earlier he had met _her_ , and slowly but surely she had wormed her way through his emotional defenses and stoic demeanor into his heart. A sniper herself with HRT, she understood Ian like few others could. First she had been an acquaintance, then a friend (and sometimes a student), then a girlfriend and confidant. Finally it came to the point that two years to the day after they had first met Ian found himself down on one knee. And so here they were.

Less than ten minutes after he had gotten home, Ian climbed into bed. As the bed dipped, his wife finely began to stir, the motion of the mattress penetrating through the fog of sleep. Still mostly asleep, she shifted slightly, and her head started to turn as she roused enough to start trying to look around.

Ian scooted up behind her and wrapped an arm around her waist. "Go back to sleep, Asha," he said, "Everything's alright. It's just me." His familiar voice soothed her half-formed worries, and she was soon asleep again. Ian soon followed.


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Note #1: I had a flash of inspiration so I wrote a second chapter for this fic. Don't expect a 3rd chapter.**

 **Author's Note #2: Sorry for the long delay since I wrote a Ian Edgerton/OFC story. My inspiration has a bad habit of fandom jumping.**

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Asha awoke slowly out of a deep sleep. She had been utterly exhausted when she had crawled in bed late the previous night, near 11pm, and waking up felt like clawing her way out of a thick fog. She sleepily dragged one eye open. The clock on her bedside table said it was 7:34am, a far too early time to be waking up on the first Saturday morning after a mission.

A few seconds later, the bed shifted, and Asha's sleep-fogged brain suddenly realized that there was a warm presence behind her, though not touching her. She tensed and rolled over, saying aloud, "Ian?"

An arm looped around her waist as she shifted. "It's just me," Ian's voice replied.

Asha scrubbed a hand across her eyes, hardly for a moment believing her eyes. Ian had been gone for a month out in North Dakota on a hunt. She hadn't even known he was headed home. Yet, there he was, lying beside her, looking down at her, propped up on one elbow. He looked the same as ever, save for some stubble and darker circles under his eyes. "You never told me you were headed back?" She accused with a frown, though without any heat in her voice.

"Yes, I did," Ian replied, his arm a warm and pleasant weight across her waist, "You just haven't checked your phone."

Asha twisted, rolling and fumbling for her cellphone, which was sitting by the clock. Opening it, she found that there were actually two unread texts from Ian. "Well, I'll be."

She put her phone back, without bothering to read the texts, and rolled back towards Ian, curling close. "When did you get back?"

"About midnight," Ian replied, "You stirred. Sort of."

Asha gave a half-shrug, "Don't remember a thing from the time I collapsed in bed till I woke up a few minutes ago."

Ian gently grabbed her chin with his free hand and turned her face so he could better see the two small rows of butterfly bandages on her cheek and forehead. "What happened to your face?" He asked, his tone going serious.

"I was wondering how long it would be till you asked," Asha said with a rueful grin. Ian had nearly gone ballistic a couple months earlier when he had returned from a trip to find his wife sporting a brilliant black eye and a broken nose, among other minor injuries, all gained in a bar fight. Asha herself never drank, since her parents had died when a drunk driver hit their car, but most of her teammates did, and she would occasionally go to a bar to have a drink and socialize and then play designated driver if need be. On the night that she had gained those injuries, one of the other patrons of that fine establishment had imbibed a mite too much and had gotten a bit handsy, and the resulting confrontation had ended in a fight that her teammates had won on her behalf after idiot decked her.

Ian raised an eyebrow, and Asha hastened to explain, "I had a confrontation with a snappy tree branch in the dark, and it won."

"And I thought you knew how to fight." Ian replied, a teasing glint in his eyes.

"Ha, ha, very funny," said Asha, gently elbowing him in the ribs before shivering dramatically at the chill in the air and pulling the covers up, leaving only her left arm free, "How was your mission?"

"Successful. Killer's in police custody, awaiting trial. Yours?"

Asha went quiet for a long minute, "The hostage is safe, but I need to clean my gun after breakfast." What she was saying was that she had been forced, as sniper, to take the shot to save the hostage. That was the job, but it didn't get easier or become less troubling, having to take one life to save another. Ian, thought by many to be somewhat cold-hearted and even callous or untroubled by his job, had declared once (and Asha had agreed) that the moment having to shoot someone stopped being troubling was the day he retired and took up a different line of work. "He had a knife to her throat," Asha continued in a low tone after a moment, "A slit throat is a nasty way to die."

"Yes, it is," Ian agreed before changing the topic, "Do you want breakfast, or do you want to sleep some more."

Asha twisted to look at the clock again. It was only about 7:45am. "It's Saturday," she replied, "I want to be lazy, but just until 8."

The two lay in silence, curled against each other, until the clock finally ticked 8am, and Asha threw the covers back and rolled upright with a sigh and a groan.

"You alright?" Ian asked, concerned.

"Just stiff," she replied, "Let me take a shower before breakfast, if you don't mind. I'll only be ten minutes."

"Go, go," Ian shooed her off.

Asha shed her sleeping clothes into the laundry basket inside the closet and headed for the shower after grabbing a fresh set of clothes to change into. A smattering of bruises stood out starkly against her copper skin. Their jobs were very physical ones, and Asha always seemed to have at least a couple of bruises from working in the woods, losing a sparring match, or from any one of a handful of other causes. At least bruises, the periodic illness, and nightmares were usually the worse she ever suffered from her job.

Leaving the bathroom door half-open so she and Ian could still talk if they wanted, Asha slipped into the shower and turned on the water as warm as she could stand it. She had gone straight from the field to the plane, gotten a couple hours sleep sitting upright in an uncomfortable chair on HRT's plane, and then driven straight home and collapsed into bed. She felt so stiff that it hurt. _Sometimes I think I'm getting too old for this_ , she grumbled internally to herself, before reminding herself that she wasn't even 36 yet.

There was a noise from the kitchen, and then Ian called out, "Is the food in the fridge safe?"

"It jolly well better be," Asha called back, "I just restocked the day before I left, and I've only been gone two days."

There were more noises from the kitchen. Ian must have been rummaging through the fridge. "Eggs good?"

"Fine."

Washing her hair with the bandage on her forehead was a pain. Scrubbing at her hair pulled on the abused skin, and the soap running down her forehead stung like the dickens.

After one particularly loud hiss of pain, Asha saw through the shower curtain Ian's shadow appear in the doorway. "You alright?" He asked.

"Soap in my cuts."

Ian was setting steaming plates of eggs and sausage and a plate of toast on the table as Asha appeared in the bathroom door a little while later, drying her hair with a towel. She looked more with it now and felt less stiff. The cuts on her face and head, however, stood out starkly against her skin.

"Can you help me with the butterfly bandages? The old ones came off in the shower," she asked.

"After breakfast," Ian replied. There was really no point in putting new bandages on damp skin. Trying to get them to stick would be an exercise in futility.

They ate quickly; except on special occasions, they were never ones to dally over food. There were always more important things to go do, more things to finish before the day was done. When they had finished eating, Asha put the dishes away, while Ian went to get the First Aid kit.

Due to the way the lighting in the kitchen was, Asha ended up perched on the counter as a space that gave Ian good enough lighting to see what he was doing and put her head at a good level.

"Your cuts look good," he said, gently tilting her head, "I'll clean them and then put new butterfly strips on."

Asha closed her eyes when he started putting the steri-strips on. She never liked seeing fingers so close to her eyes and sometimes would flinch. Ian worked quickly, and soon he was done.

"You're good," Ian said, squeezing her shoulder and moving back so that she could jump down from the counter.

"Thanks," she said, hopping down and giving him a quick kiss, "Will if I get in your way if I clean my rifle?"

"No," Ian replied, starting to put the med supplies away. He was never one to use three words when one would do.

The morning passed quietly. Asha pushed aside the table by the couch and spread the pieces of her dissembled sniper rifle across a sheet on the floor. (She always had to be careful when working with or cleaning her rifle and had it disassembled that she never lost any pieces. Even a small missing piece could cause a disaster in the field.) She spent the morning going over her rifle with a fine-tooth comb, cleaning it and checking that everything was in working order. Ian was sitting on the couch working on a report for his latest mission and occasionally inserting sarcastic comments as he wrote.

Asha went back to cleaning after lunch, stripping and cleaning her duty pistol and her backup and then cleaning her knives. By the time she came to her last knife, she found herself starting to nod. One night in bed could not make up for two days in the field without almost any sleep.

"Go take a nap, Asha, before you drop," Said Ian, rescuing a bottle from her hands when her head started to nod. He had joined her a little while earlier to clean his own guns, "I'll finish your knife."

Asha gave a sleepy half-smile and handed the bottle of lubricant and nylon pad over. She climbed to her feet and crawled straight into bed. Within a few minutes, she was asleep. Asha slept soundly for some time until she was woken by a gentle hand on her shoulder. The room had grown dark, the lights dimmed. Ian had draped a throw blanket over here while she had been asleep, and he was now sitting on the edge of her bed.

"It's about 5," he said, "If you don't get up soon, you aren't going to sleep tonight."

Asha pushed herself upright slowly, rubbing her free hand across her eyes, "I'm up. I'm up."

Ian started to rise, but she caught his hand to stop him. He smiled when she immediately leaned in for a hug. He wrapped his long arms securely around her as she rested her head against his chest.

"This is not an excuse for you to go back to sleep," he said, pressing a kiss to her hair, a fond smile on his face. Ian was not the touchy-feely type, not prone to elaborate gestures, but Asha had reminded him that even an old sniper needed someone, showed him the value of even a simple hug. Asha was not the overly touchy-feely type, either, but liked physical contact from people she trusted, often preferring to show her affection through deeds, than words. In bed, they often slept curled together. When she sat on the floor to work and Ian was on the couch, she would sometimes lean against his legs. When they were both on the couch together, she often curled against his side. Other times, she just tucked herself under his arm.

"Grump," mumbled Asha, playfully, a teasing lilt to her words.

Ian, his chin resting on her head, gave a small hidden smile and hugged her a moment later, before pulling back and rising. Asha, with a half-smile, half playful smirk, made a show of throwing back the blanket and getting to her feet.

"Take-out for dinner?" Ian asked, returning to the couch where Asha could see the glow of his laptop screen, "Or would you prefer to go out?"

"Don't care," Asha replied.

Asha and Ian ended up ordering take-out and spent a quiet evening at home. After days for Asha and weeks for Ian of a hectic pace in the field, it was nice to relax, spend time together, and for a few short hours, not worry about work.


End file.
